My FI and I have booked most of our big ticket items for the wedding: venue, photographer, caterer, DJ, photo booth, etc. The only thing that has been “paid in full” is my wedding dress. I noticed that many of our vendors allow the bride and groom to pay the amount due in full several months before the wedding. My question is this: Should we pay for things as we go, meaning, just pay off the photographer, DJ, photo booth etc. as we secure the money, or should we wait until closer to the wedding?

My reasons for wanting to do so now are that I don’t want to worry about it weeks, if not days, before the wedding. I would rather pay it off in full and then not have to worry about it. I plan on asking for receipts/invoices from each vendor as I make a payment.

Current or past brides please weigh in: Did you pay off your vendors prior to the wedding? If so, how long before? Or did you wait until the night of? Any advice?

MrsMeowton: I paid for my vendors when the final payments were due (so normally in the final weeks leading up to the wedding). My theory is why should I pay early and let them earn interest on money that I could be earning interest on! If you know you have the money there ready to go then I would be putting it into a high interest savings online savings accout or similar and then don’t touch it until the payments need to be made. I also did have my make up artist pull out a week before the wedding due to a family illness/emergency. It took me 6 weeks to get my deposit back from her so I am very glad I only had to chase $80 rather than $500 had I paid in full! I needed to book someone else straight away and have the money there to pay them.

We decided to pay our vendors in full as early as we could. Just under four months from the wedding, I am so glad we did. Now we know that the only expenses we have to worry about are paying the last bit of the catering cost (we paid the majority of it early but will pay the remainder once we have a final guest count and actually know the final price) and any other little stuff that comes up along the way. I tell ya, the feeling is amazing. The stress off my shoulders is so worth forgoing the little bit of interest we could have made with the money just sitting in our savings account for a few extra months. (I will say, though, that we have very clear contracts with all our vendors that outline cancellation policies and refunds in ridiculous amounts of detail.) If you think it’ll save you some headache by taking one more thing off your plate in those final weeks, I say go for it!

MrsMeowton: I paid my vendors when final payments were due, but I set aside the amounts in a separate savings account so that I wouldn’t have any surprises. My theory was, as long as we have the money we don’t need to worry about it, plus I can let the money gain interest in my account while I wait. Just be sure that the pricing is clearly outlined in all of your contracts.